US:The roulette wheels never stop spinning and the slot machines don't stop churning at the Bellagio, the opulent Las Vegas casino featured in Ocean's Eleven, but service could be a little slow tomorrow morning.
At about 11 am, the bartenders, dishwashers, porters, cleaners and many other staff will leave their posts and meet in a vast ballroom to take part in Nevada's Democratic presidential caucus.
The Democratic party has allowed shift workers to caucus at the Bellagio and eight other casinos on the Las Vegas Strip, so that casino workers could account for as many as 10 per cent of Nevada caucus-goers.
Nobody took much notice of the casino caucus venues, which were approved last March, until the 60,000-strong Culinary Workers Union endorsed Barack Obama early last week. The union, which is by far the biggest, most powerful and most disciplined in the state, represents many casino and hotel workers on the strip, about 40 per cent of whom are of Hispanic origin.
After the culinary workers backed Obama, a teachers' union that is supporting Hillary Clinton filed a lawsuit, claiming casino workers were being given an unfair advantage in tomorrow's caucuses.
"This isn't our lawsuit. We are going to play by whatever rules the court determines are appropriate," insists Rory Reid, state chairman for the Clinton campaign.
Nobody doubts, however, that the support of the culinary workers is a huge boost to Obama, not least because the caucus involves declaring your choice of candidate in public, which is likely to encourage union solidarity.
Tomorrow's caucus is an important test for the Illinois senator, who hopes to regain the momentum he lost in New Hampshire by winning in Nevada and South Carolina.
At a town hall meeting in Henderson, Nevada's second largest city, there was little of the excitement that has accompanied most Obama events and there were even a few rows of seats empty. The audience of about 300 was mostly white, with a few dozen African-Americans but almost no Latinos.
This was in sharp contrast to Hillary Clinton's rally at a Las Vegas school the previous evening, where most of those present appeared to be Hispanic and there were as many signs in Spanish as in English.
Although Clinton leads in some polls, her campaign is braced for a possible defeat, partly because of the unrivalled organising power of the culinary workers.
Both candidates are running TV ads in Spanish, with Clinton's ad describing her as "La voz de los que no tienen voz" - the voice of the voiceless.
Nevada has been especially hard hit by the sub-prime mortgage meltdown and has the highest rate of home repossessions in the US. Indeed, when Clinton asked at her rally how many people had lost their homes or felt in danger of losing them, almost half the hands in the hall shot up.
Clinton has called for a 90-day moratorium on repossessions and a five-year interest rate freeze for homeowners. She told her audience that the mortgage crisis was a problem not just for those directly affected but for their neighbours too.
"It's not just that a family loses a home, which is a tragedy," she said. "It's that you have a vacant home in the neighbourhood. Pretty soon the weeds start to grow. Pretty soon, more houses get foreclosed on and then property taxes decrease and the police can't have the same level of patrols because they can't be paid."
Clinton has also sought to get ahead of her Democratic rivals on the other big issue exercising Nevada voters - the future of a proposed nuclear waste repository on Yucca Mountain, about 100 miles from Las Vegas. A consistent opponent of the plan, which John Edwards voted for twice, Clinton said it would be "off the table forever" if she becomes president.
With polls showing only a few points separating the three candidates, Edwards has been campaigning energetically and hopes his union supporters will show up to caucus tomorrow.
At the Egg and I diner in Las Vegas, he moved swiftly through the room, shaking hands, signing pictures and fliers and one teenager's sneakers as he soaked up compliments from doting matrons.
"You're even prettier in person," one woman gushed.
Audrey Ehrlich was supporting Joe Biden until the Delaware senator dropped out after the Iowa caucus two weeks ago but she has now shifted her allegiance to Edwards.
"My neighbour is a strong Hillary supporter but I think John Edwards's focus on the middle class and the poor is really the most important thing that's going on now," she said.
"He saw that the economy was going to be in trouble; he's right on Iraq; he's just right on all the issues.
"Joe Biden always said 'close your eyes and imagine who would be the best president, not just the best candidate' - and that's him."